How can Democrats win back the House?

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > How can Democrats win back the House?

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

Smudgie Buggler posted:

Why would you make a claim that's so easy to falsify?

There were 53,023 total incidents of gun violence in the USA in 2015. 4,372 of those incidents involved cops in some way (shooting or getting shot at).

Of those incidents that involved cops, 1140 ended in a cop killing someone (actually not all of these are gun deaths, but the vast majority are). Of those 1140 killed by cops, 303 were black. This would indicate that about 1,162 of the 4,372 incidents of gun violence with cops involved also involved at least one black person who wasn't a cop.

In 2013, there were 5,723 murder victims in the United States, 2,491 of them black.

You are massively more likely as an American of any race to be shot by a fellow citizen than by a cop.

Pretty sure he meant a cop is more likely to kill someone then a gun owner.

But that's just me thinking when someone says something obviously wrong that would make complete sense with a minor alteration it was probably a misstatement instead of writing a treatise in order to slam dunk on it.

# ¿ Feb 9, 2016 14:08

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# ¿ May 22, 2024 09:00

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

The problem with the assault weapon stupidity is that not only does it antagonize gun owners it's plainly stupid policy.

Seriously it's like so loving dumb to anyone with the slightest knowledge of guns it actively discredits gun control in the same way "the internet is a series of tubes" discredited the anti net neutrality crowd.

Only Ted Stevens' analogy made way more sense.

# ¿ Feb 9, 2016 20:41

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

gobbagool posted:

Making laws that are ignored, and everybody recognizes that they are ignored, like the NYS SAFE Act, does nothing to help the rule of law, but rather makes an entire class of otherwise law abiding citizens into criminals. Funny that the SAFE Act only resulted in a few thousand registered "assault weapons" out of the 1-2 million estimated to exist in NYS. To your point exactly, Andrew Cuomo attempted to outlaw magazines that held more than 7 bullets in the process, effectively rendering useless every single modern sporting rifle in the state. Now, did he do that out of ignorance, or malice? My guess is, the deep thinkers of the administration wanted to keep the existing limit of 10 rounds, but Cuomo, being half the politician his father was, with twice the mouth, arbitrarily declared 7 a better number than 10 and went on tv and had a Howard Dean-esque meltdown about killing deer. Yet here we are, 2+ years later, stuck with the stupid SAFE act that everybody is ignoring, but it's still on the books. He'll continue to get re-elected in NYS because he holds the correct opinions on BLM and Abortion, but that's as much because the Republican party barely exists here any more.

The worst part is that the mag size bans are actually the most sane of these policies. I can actually understand (though not necessarily agree) with wanting to ban civilian firearms with detachable box magazines. For 10 years we had federal legislation banning firearms on the grounds of things like bayonet lugs and flash suppressors.

# ¿ Feb 9, 2016 22:07

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

Liquid Communism posted:

Yes, which was one of the most embarrassingly useless federal firearms restrictions ever, and was allowed to sunset with little fanfare because it accomplished nothing .

The AWB is absolutely not what you want to model any effective gun control policy off of, because it was purely about scary looking cosmetics.

Regarding 'box magazines', you do realize that you are appealing to an effective ban on 90% of pistols and rifles developed in the last century, yes? Other than 1800's era tube fed rifles, revolvers, most shotguns, and the rare few break action rifles, the vast majority of firearms use a detachable box magazine.

yes, I do, I wasn't advocating it, I was simply stating it at least targeted a feature that actually made sense from a "limit mass shooting capability" standpoint.

Though you're over stating a little bit in regards to rifles, that was really a WW2 era advancement not a 1800's era, there's a lot of rifles with fixed box magazines (granted many of those weapons were designed in the 1800s and then used up through WW2 so I guess that's a bit of a wash).

Jarmak fucked around with this message at 22:37 on Feb 9, 2016

# ¿ Feb 9, 2016 22:20

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

Liquid Communism posted:

At the end of the day, mass shootings are a terrible thing to base sweeping gun laws on in the first place. They are the rarest of firearms crimes, and are generally committed by perpetrators whose plans are only obvious in hindsight, and for whom only mass confiscation of all privately owned firearms would really stand as a preventative measure. Most of them have clean backgrounds and no reason to be denied on a background check, or obtain their weapons (as the Sandy Hook killer did) via murder and theft.

I'm not sure why you're arguing with me

# ¿ Feb 9, 2016 22:56

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

Main Paineframe posted:

Any voter whose "hearts and minds" are more concerned with gun laws (which they claim won't affect them anyway) than they are about civil rights, the economy, corruption and exploitation, or any of the other actual issues affecting America today probably weren't going to vote Democrat anyway, since the NRA is so far in bed with the Republicans it might as well be a pillow. I'm having trouble buying the fundamental assertion here - that there are a large number of people who are seriously in favor of minority rights, combating inequality, and so on, but voted against those things because they thought the right of rich white people to buy some particular flavor of firearms without background checks was more important than protecting the equality of black people, Muslims, and women.

Wait when did gun owners become not only solely white people but solely rich white people?

# ¿ Feb 11, 2016 00:08

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

Main Paineframe posted:

Sure. The problem is that the "gun control is killing the Dems" people expect me to believe that these people would vote for higher taxes on themselves to support poor people, affirmative action that helps minorities but not themselves, and other assorted progressive measures that involve sacrificing their white privilege and economic prosperity and even safety in order to help the less fortunate, but the possibility of experiencing mild inconveniences in the course of their gun hobby is the one thing they absolutely have to vote selfishly on? Bullshit. They'd still be voting Republican even if the Dems left the status quo as otbis and didn't push further gun control.

Well, gun hobbyists sure as heck ain't poor

Actually a large number if not the majority of gun hobbyists are poor, it's like you've never been to a rural area in your life.

I'm not sure how many people would switch sides if the dems stopped pushing gun control, but I sure as hell know there's a lot of rural people who don't really care for the republicans but they vote for them because they're scared the democrats are going to take their guns away. Maybe they won't come pull a D lever but I bet a whole lot of them would stay home instead of pulling R.

Also it's creepy as gently caress that you're so lacking in empathy that you think these people view these laws as "a minor inconvenience to their hobby".

# ¿ Feb 11, 2016 02:08

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

icantfindaname posted:

it's creepy as gently caress that these people's hobby revolves around deadly weapons of war

To a large portion of this country firearms are the most important cultural symbol of self reliance.

This "Lol ur hobby is dumb" is both incredibly alienating culture war bullshit and a strong signal that the democratic party not only doesn't understand them but is actively against them.

# ¿ Feb 12, 2016 03:13

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

VitalSigns posted:

Gun control doesn't matter. The right will just make up some other culture war poo poo to get people who don't understand why they're poor and isolated all paranoid and angry about something just like they did with abortion and gays and Mexicans and terrism and welfare queens and evolution. They'll just go anti vax or anti zoning restrictions or anti elementary school or some other drat thing which will be the new Threat To Freedom and the new Thing Elitist Democrats Want to Force On You/Take From You.

Republicans were just fine with gun control in the 70s and 80s, it's entirely manufactured because that's what the right is good at and that's what works to give hurting people an imaginary enemy to fight. We'd just be back here again with posters saying "hey you know if only you'd give up on vaccination then you'll steal the GOP's constituency right out from other them gosh you guys it's so easy".

"The government takes from you and they want to take even more" has been extremely successful for the right ever since civil rights broke the New Deal Coalition. It's been used to support gun control (the blacks and democrats want to rob and kill you, Republicans will protect you) and to oppose it (Clinton wants to disarm you so the blacks and democrats can rob and kill you, Republicans will protect you). The party that tried to stop medicare and wants to repeal it has even successfully convinced people that the government wants to take over medicare and of course once the government runs Medicare they're going to take it from you. It really doesn't matter what the specific issue is, the Republicans will find another issue or they'll do like Medicare and just lie about it over and over until scared people believe it.

Republicans were okay with gun control back in the 70s when it was "hey maybe we should do something to keep all these minorities from owning guns", they've never been on board with having their gun rights taken away. Trying to act like this is the same debate they were in support of in the 70s is about as intellectually honest as claiming democrats are the real racists because Lincoln was a Republican.

# ¿ Feb 12, 2016 07:44

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

VitalSigns posted:

The 70s are not some long-lost historical time and all the actors are long dead, many of the same politicians were around in the 90s. You're making my point for me: it wasn't about the core issue; it was all about the marketing. In the 70s it was marketed as a wink-wink nudge-nudge we're keeping guns out of the hands of the wrong people. In the 90s they needed the presidency so gun control was an evil Clinton plot to take your freedom.

Triangulating culture war poo poo like this is pointless, as you point out, the right changed the debate in the 90's and successfully marketed a consumer good to people as a core identity and the gun manufacturers were all too happy to get on board and rake in profits with scare campaigns about how it's time to stock up on guns and ammo because Obama is coming to take it away, so successful even that people ITT are freeping out about how any gun regulation is a secret plot to take them all away and unman them.

There are endless issues the right can use for this purpose, they're already dipping a toe in antivax to see if something that's currently the domain of fringe religious nuts and woo-woo natural medicine quacks could be used to frighten the poor and the uneducated over big government injecting chemicals into our children. And might I point out Medicare/Medicaid again, how the party that wants to demolish it campaigned on calling Obama's expansion of Medicaid a "government takeover" of those popular government programs.

Do you not remember the 90s? It wasn't marketing that changed, what changed was Democrats were pushing gun control pretty loving hard.

# ¿ Feb 12, 2016 08:36

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

VitalSigns posted:

No it was the marketing. As was pointed out in the post above yours, Mitt Romney banned assault weapons in Massachusetts as late as 2004 and he still got the NRA endorsement for president eight years later.

E: Cue "2004-Romney was a totally different person from 2012-Romney, that's like bringing up that the Republicans freed the slaves in 1863! 2004 get real, no one was even alive then!"

What exactly do you think that proves that supports your position? That the NRA, known for being a completely partisan organization, endorsed the republican candidate for president?

Do you think Romney wanted to implement federal gun control?

Is this supposed to be some sort of evidence that my memories of the gun control debate from the 90s were implanted by aliens?

Also if you think that the reason that "Lincoln was a republican" is dishonest is because it was a long time ago I don't even know what to say, your grasp on basic concepts is tenuous at best. Maybe try googling "the southern strategy"?

# ¿ Feb 12, 2016 17:59

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

Main Paineframe posted:

Plenty of people in this thread have suggested that there are a bunch of people out there who are Dems on social issues but are refusing to vote Democratic because they care more about gun control than about social issues. Now you're saying that all current Dem voters won't be affected by dropping gun control because every current voter cares more about social issues than gun control. That just stinks of having it both ways - dropping gun control will help because the Dem base cares more about gun control than social issues, but it won't hurt because the Dem base cares more about social issues than gun control?

Do you actually read what other people post in this thread?

Seriously, please point out where someone said doing gun control would motivate the democratic base.

# ¿ Feb 14, 2016 18:39

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

VitalSigns posted:

And yet that endorsement was more powerful than facts, since Obama doesn't want to ban guns either but that didn't stop ammo from selling out at his reelection as the Republicans and the NRA convinced everybody that he was secretly plotting to anyway. Somehow I don't think the same would have happened if the guy with a record of gun control but with an R next to his name had gotten the job.

Your memories of the 90s are shaped by the subsequent framing and marketing. The assault weapon ban that everyone is mewling about was supported by George HW Bush, and Ronald Reagan even whipped for it in congress, it would likely have passed no matter who had won in 1992, probably by greater margins because a sitting Republican President would have been in a better position to whip for it.

You've bought into the framing of the weaksauce assault weapons ban (which, in an attempt to appeal to hobbyists and sport shooters, was designed to affect them as little as possible by focusing only on cosmetic tacticlol poo poo like flash suppressors and buttstocks) as a secret plot to disarm the people. This was manufactured by Republicans when the party decided to abandon the legacy of Reagan and HW Bush and deliberately disseminate conspiracy theories and frighten people into voting for them and now gun control is another piece of good governance that, like education, healthcare, and infrastructure has become bad because Democrats do it.

That's cool that you like your shooting hobby, I like it too, but Democrats aren't going to have better electoral success by abandoning gun control any more than they would by going full warmonger. The gun owners who are capable of looking at facts already know that Democrats aren't coming to take their guns and that things like expanded background checks are a good idea, sorry bout your pet issue.

Just look at what happened when Obama floated the idea of invading Syria and deposing Assad. If a Republican president tried that they'd be pissing themselves with joy and calling us the vanguard of democracy and anyone who opposed it a traitor, but because Democrat they called him a warmonger terrorist-lover and tried to de-fund it. The President can't loving kill Osama bin Laden with a D next to his name and peel of Republicans, you think they'd vote for him if he started giving "hell yeah AR-15" speeches? They'd probably call him a terrorist.

Clinton signed two major gun control bills in his first two years in office, both bills passed along party lines, the fact Reagan became rather pro control in his later years doesn't change this fact. Then within less then a year the democrats then suffered what was at that point the worst electoral defeat in in US history, losing majorities in the house and senate. Gun control was a major part of the democratic party platform in the 90s and they only stopped pushing it because they got curb stomped repeatedly over it.

# ¿ Feb 15, 2016 03:45

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

VitalSigns posted:

Yeah this is the kind of conspiracy-theory poo poo I'm talking about. The president doesn't hate and want to punish gun owners: the reason the assault weapons ban focuses on stupid poo poo because it's an appeal to sport shooters and hobbyists that leaves the stuff they care about legal and focuses on cosmetic tacticlol crap. It's a pretty great deal for anyone who wants guns for serious purposes, it only pisses off people who think they need collapsible buttstocks to defend freedom from Obama's black panther NWO forces, unfortunately the Republicans have decided to appeal to those people and gun manufacturers found they could make a lot of money by selling gun ownership as a personal identity.

Anyone capable of looking at the situation objectively like Reagan and HW Bush did can see that the assault weapons ban isn't an attack on legitimate gun ownership, it didn't lead to tyranny, and there's no sense in making it your single-issue vote unless you're a crazy conspiracy theorist and those people aren't going to vote for Democrats no matter what. It's irrelevant to me, your pet issue is not what's keeping the House and state governments in Republican hands.

The AWB only and I mean only fucks with sport shooters and hobbyists.

# ¿ Feb 15, 2016 04:04

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

Not one of the posters arguing for dropping gun control have posted any surveys/statistics/demographic data to support their position. I and others haves made arguments in favor of keeping gun control backed by at least some evidence. I think maybe it's the posters who keep repeating the same point without even attempting to provide evidence that care more about their ideology then strategy's that will actually win Dem's the house back.

I'll repeat for the third time, 35% of the Dems base is black or hispanic, both groups overwhelmingly support gun control. The black and hispanic vote will be the largest voting bloc in the next few decades. Dropping gun control is not an option if the Dems want to be relevant in the future.

Also, we get it, survey's aren't perfect. But you guys have yet to provide a single piece of evidence to support your position, nor have you provided any evidence that gun control is a bigger wedge issue than abortion/minimum wage/whatever. Seriously, please either shut the gently caress up about guns or make a coherent argument backed by actual evidence that goes beyond "guns are cool and republicans don't like gun control, so let's drop gun control!"

The evidence posted is absolutely worthless for proving what is being argued. Worthless evidence is not better then no evidence.

Also I did post evidence, we literally saw this all play out during the first term of Clinton's presidency.

Helsing posted:

That's because the arguments aren't really symmetrical in the way you're implying. I don't see any Democratic posters claiming that if the party would just introduce even harsher and more sweeping gun control legislation then they would somehow get more votes. Instead they're making the fairly reasonable point that a lot of Democratic voters and donors support gun control, meaning that de-emphasizing it as a policy might cost as many or more votes and donations as it would win. I hope you can see how this is a relatively modest and conventional argument: de-emphasizing policy that the party base has long championed may cost the party as much as it benefits. Contrast that with the argument several gun advocates have made: "adopting radically new policy that alienates the base and which is premised on attracting swing voters who haven't actually been proven to exist will be the key to victory".

Those gun control arguments may or may not be wrong, but they aren't really comparable to the multiple gun owners who have actually argued that gun control is a bigger issue than economics or gerrymandering in explaining why Democrats lose. One side here is making an argument that may or may not be wrong, the other side is basically talking gibberish.

Since I'm not an American I can't say I'm hugely invested in how much you guys restrict guns. I don't tend to think gun ownership should be illegal but when I observe Americans debating gun control I find the policy details are less striking than the amount of raw tribalism on display. So far as I can tell there aren't any other liberal democracies that have anything resembling what passing mainstream discourse on guns in America.

Anyway, as I said repeatedly upthread I think the best reason to de-emphasize gun control as an issue is that it is unlikely to gain traction and the entire spectacle of the gun debate makes it harder for the Dems to focus on positive areas where they could make actual progress and attain new votes. But the idea being pushed in this thread that gun control is a super consequential issue in its own right is, as I said above, a very transparent attempt for a couple of posters here to try and assert that their personal priorities somehow provide the key for how national elections are fought and won.

The tribalism is exactly the point of why dems should stop pushing this issue.

# ¿ Feb 15, 2016 17:59

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

Is this the evidence you're talking about?

That's not really evidence so much as a logical fallacy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc

What are your issues with the evidence I provided? Do you disagree with the assertion that blacks and hispanics are 35% of the dems base? Do you have evidence to suggest that gun control isn't widely supported among black and hispanic voters?

Yes you're right, tying elected officials election results to the actions they took as elected officials during their term immediately preceding the election is totally a post hoc on it's face, that's not hand-wavey at all.

Also for the loving millionth time the argument has never been "gun control doesn't have support". It has been "support for gun control doesn't drive people to the polls the way opposition to gun control does". So responding "but but look, I told you there was support for gun control" is not only utterly worthless data, but betrays the fact that after pages of this poo poo you still doesn't even grasp the basic core of what we're even arguing about.

# ¿ Feb 15, 2016 20:07

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

Yes it is absolutely a post hoc rationalization when there are tons of other factors and you haven't posted any evidence to support your position. In fact I'm willing to make the argument that Dems pushing welfare reform and all but abandoning its minority base in 1992 had a much larger affect on them losing subsequent elections than gun control. In fact other people have made the same argument, and there is actually data to back up that argument:

Oh, and you do know that gun control was part of Clinton's platform leading up to the 1992 election right? Do you have an explanation for why it tanked the Dems in 1994 but won them the election two years prior?

Except that the democratic party actually did better with minorities in 1994 then 1990, gently caress the difference was with white males. The 1994 election was where the term "angry white males" to describe a voting block comes from. Gun control wasn't the sole driving issue but it was a major contributor to the culture war bullshit that drove that election. It's also kind of amusing you say "union members" since union members are the primary gun owning demographic in the Democratic party.

Helsing posted:

It kind of is when there were so many other unusual factors playing into the 94 election including a failed attempt to implement universal healthcare. The preceding period had also seen a Democratic President going against a large part of his voter base, including key constituents like labor unions, to push for the implementation of NAFTA, something many Democratic representatives in the House were against. Tom Foley, Speaker of the House at the time, famously went against his own colleagues and sided with Clinton, which probably contributed to his unprecedented defeat the next year when he became the first House Leader to be defeated in a re-election campaign since 1862.

There are less spurious ways to support your case. A few Democrats like Bill Clinton have actually mused about whether gun control cost them that election. I think the reason Clinton would argue that is really because it helps cover up the damage he and the DLC did to the party by largely abandoning key Democratic voter groups like African Americans and trade unionists. But at least if you were bringing up Clinton's statements then at least we'd be having a debate with some kind of evidence attached to it instead of some very tenuous grasping at straws.

I'll add to this that it's very interesting how DLC New Democrats and Gun Owners can find a common cause in this particular area: they might be on different sides of the issue, but both groups really want to make the 1994 election somehow have an explanation other than Bill Clinton's realignment of the party toward the right.

Yeah but the counter argument is that since perception massively trumps reality here the idea that gun nuts will be less motivated to vote based on something the Democrats say or do in the real world is dubious at best. There are already huge numbers of people convinced, contrary to any evidence, that the government is on the verge of outlawing and confiscating guns. The idea that the Democrats could put out a press release saying "we're not going to touch guns" and that this would somehow help them electorally just doesn't have much support whatever way you want to slice it.

If you want to just argue that you should be allowed to have your guns go ahead. I do not understand this stubborn and almost farcical conviction so many of ya'll have that this particular issue is super important for deciding national elections. Seems more like an existential cry asserting your importance than an actual reasoned political position.

Seriously? "someone had an opinion" is the evidence you were looking for? Cause Clinton has been very openly arguing exactly the same thing I am, and the Democratic leadership (as well as Clinton and Lieberman) believed gun control lost them the 2000 election as well:

Bill Clinton posted:

All these polls that you see saying the public is for us on all these issues � they are meaningless if they�re not voting issues

http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/bill-clinton-warns-democrats-against-overreaching-on-gun-debate/

Salon.com posted:

As Franklin Foer reported in the New Republic, �The hand-wringing began just as the Supreme Court awarded Florida�s electoral votes to George W. Bush.� Early in December, by Foer�s telling, then-House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., summoned House Democrats to his Capitol office, 20 at a time, and gave a sales presentation. Pollster Mark Gersh pointed to charts and told the Democrats they�d lost because culture war issues, especially gun control, had distracted voters. Many apparently went away convinced.

By the middle of 2001, ditching gun control had become conventional wisdom among centrist Democrats. Sen. Zell Miller, D-Ga., said Al Gore had talked about it too much. Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, Gore�s running mate, thought gun control had cost the Democratic ticket �a number of voters who on almost every other issue realized they�d be better off with Al Gore.� Terry McAuliffe, head of the Democratic National Committee, in particular wanted his party to drop the issue. In a June 2001 article discussing McAuliffe�s strategy, Roger Simon cited a strong correlation between gun ownership and voting for Bush, as demonstrated by exit poll stats.

http://www.salon.com/2007/04/18/dems_and_guns/

# ¿ Feb 15, 2016 23:45

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

I didn't say anything about unions? You're fitting the narrative to match your ideology instead of looking at actual data. Sure Dems did better with minorities in 1994 than 1990, but that doesn't disprove the trend of minority turnout decreasing after 1992:

1992 had a far higher voter turnout amongst "angry white males" yet the Dems still won with a platform that included gun control. Now please shut the gently caress up about guns and make a real suggestion for winning back the house.

Wait are you simultaneous arguing that proportional minority turnout dropped after 1992 and that white turnout was higher in 1992 then in 1994? Also good job grabbing numbers of only presidential election years to make a point about midterm elections, that makes lots of sense.

The union member comment was in regard to Helsing's post, I put it in the wrong place.

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 00:31

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

No I'm not arguing that. I said nothing about the proportion of white voters, merely that in absolute numbers there were more white voters in 1992 than 1994. And you're right I suppose we are talking about midterm elections. So have a look at this:

Oh hey, it looks like between the mid to late 80s to mid 90s minority voter turnout drastically decreased while white voter turnout remain relatively flat. That sounds remarkably like what I've been saying! Good job still not posting any evidence to back up your argument!

Still waiting... In the mean time, does anyone have ideas that don't involve guns?

Census data says everyone's turnout was relatively flat:

https://www.census.gov/hhes/www/socdemo/voting/publications/p20/1994/htables.html

Also I've put up plenty of evidence, more then you have at least, you just don't like it.

Could you please tell me what sort of evidence you won't hand wave away? "Why someone lost an election 20 years ago" isn't exactly something you can test in a lab, it's something people usually debate with logical inference.

Jarmak fucked around with this message at 01:33 on Feb 16, 2016

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 01:25

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

gently caress you, you disengenuous piece of poo poo. The sum total of the evidence you have provided is a just-so story about why Dems lost an election.

Hmmm, looks like you agree with me that gun control did not in fact cause an uptick in voter turnout for the Republicans. Although I'm curious why you didn't quote that table directly:

Hmmmm... I think I'll accept almost any evidence that isn't deliberately misleading bullshit.

Why the gently caress are you including 1986?

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 03:48

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

I included 1986 because I have an annoying habit of presenting evidence that supports my argument.

Feel free to exclude 1986, you're still full of poo poo.
[/quote]

The 1990 to 1994 numbers are relatively flat, you're trying explain a difference in electoral success between the 1992 election and the 1994 election by pointing at a turnout drop off that primarily manifested from 1986-1990.

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 05:56

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

I'm afraid at this point I must assume you are innumerate.
code:
1986 - 1990: 9.26% decrease in black turnout, 0.6383% decrease in white turnout
1990 - 1994: 5.36% decrease in black turnout, 1.285% increase in white turnout

standard deviation from 1990 - 1994 for black voters = 1.48492
standard deviation from 1990 - 1994 for white voters = 0.424264

standard deviation from 1986 - 1994 for black voters = 3.09892
standard deviation from 1986 - 1994 for white voters = 0.30
1990 - 1994: 5.36% decrease in black turnout, 1.285% increase in white turnout

Now I already know what you're going to say, so lemme go ahead and post it for you:

Wrong, but I'm tired of doing it for you so feel free to run the numbers yourself and post here when you figure out how wrong you are. Or just stop posting. Either works.

Cool, great post! That would make an excellent topic for a gun control thread, you should start one!

At this point I'm going to assume you're not arguing in the remotest of good faith, are you loving serious? You're taking the percentage of a percentage so that you can inflate the number just enough to say that 5% is significant.

Black turnout decreased by 2.1%, white increased by .7%

Also you're being obtuse as gently caress because you're conveniently ignoring just how badly the Democrats lost the white vote in that election, bad enough we got new terminology to to describe it bad, bad enough that not only did Republicans get a majority of white southern voters for the first time in history, they did it by 28%. White men alone went from going for the democrats 51.2% to 48.8% in 1992 to going for republicans 69.5% to 30.5% in 1994.

But yeah I'm sure that 2% decrease in black voters is what caused the historic losses, somehow not in 1992 mind you after the sharpest of the drop in turnout, but 2 years later after the drop off mellowed a bit. Must be some time delayed or something.

http://www.jstor.org/stable/3595625?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 08:04

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

I feel bad now because it seems you are actually innumerate. Let me help you out. Voter turnout is by definition a percentage, the ratio of the number of people who voted to the total number of people eligible to vote. To look at the relative change in voter turnout, you have to then take the percent difference (a percentage of a percentage). You can also look at the absolute difference, which would be measured in percentage points, that is black turnout decreased by 2.1 percentage points, not percent.

Your assertion was that voter turnout was flat amongst all races between 1990 - 1994. If your assertion were true then all races would have a fairly small standard deviation, which does not seem to be true. Oh and by the way, the units for standard deviation in this case are percentage points, which I listed right there for you. I'll admit I should have listed the units, but hey at least I didn't swap "%" for "percentage point" and then accuse you of not arguing in good faith.

Thanks for posting a link to some actual evidence, but I at no point disagreed with the idea that white southerners swung to the republicans.

Did fishmech get a new account?

I'm seriously asking

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 15:56

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

*claims turnout was relatively flat* "Hey man why are you calculating the relative difference, that's not fair!"

Why are you still posting in this thread? The only cogent argument you've made so far has been for better math education.

You're a loving idiot: 1) that's not what standard deviation means, 2) seriously you're calculating standard deviation with a sample size of 2!? 3) In my field standard deviation is typically used as a way to calculate error, frequently for the purposes of seeing whether the sampling size was adequate which makes (2) even more hilarious.

Secondly you're arguing over the whether the relative difference of a handful of percentage points is more relevant then the absolute difference in support of a theory that's already been shown to be completely retarded. Seriously you're trying to argue that a 2% decrease in turnout among black is responsible for going from victory to the greatest electoral defeat in the second half of the 20th century, a historic event noted and studied for the how dramatically the white vote flipped.

You're sitting here arguing that the Arizona really sunk due to spontaneous metal fatigue and responding to being shown video of Japanese bombers by trying to be smug about having corrected someone on the p-n value of steel (and still being wrong).

edit: so again, is this a new fishmech account?

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 18:00

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

2% difference is relatively flat.

The fact that standard deviation is a useless measure for a sample size of two does not change because you don't have access to a larger sample size.

But please keep rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic that was your argument. In sure it was a 2% drop in black turnout not the 30% swing in white males voting republican that caused 1994.

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 19:41

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

skeet decorator posted:

Absolute and relative difference have precise definitions that you should maybe look up if you're going to use them.

Really!? This is what you're loving sperging about? That I used the term "relatively" in casual conversation as a stand in for "in the grand scheme of things" instead of doing a precise statistical analysis?

Fine you want to play robot I'll loving bite, only lets not cherry pick data this time shall we? The STDEV for black voter turnout for all years in that data is 3.58%, the mean is 39.83%, the 1994 turnout was 37.1% , or just barely more then half a standard deviation.

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 22:44

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# ¿ May 22, 2024 09:00

Jarmak: Jan 24, 2005

Really? Federal prisons are what we're arguing about?

That's like being on a plane that just lost both wings and the engine's on fire and having a slapfight about how we should address the fact the rudder is sticking a little bit.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2016 19:05

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